TAMING AND IMPRINTING

The collared peccary tames quickly if removed from the mother and handled at an early age. This readiness to taming has been described by many writers (Azara in Hunter 1838; Orton 1876; Mearns 1907; Cook 1909; Grant 1916; Gaumer 1917; Nelson 1918; Goldman 1920; Steon 1929; Cabrera and Yepes 1940; Lowie 1946; Handley 1950; Bennett 1962; Noguiera-Neto 1973; and Smole 1976). In a book entitled Sketches in Natural History of Mammalia (Anon. 1849) the author said, “it is domesticated with more facility than the wild hog, and becomes troublesome from its familiarity.” This author, like others, is talking about pet-keeping rather than true domestication, which implies the taming of many successive generations of subjugated animals. The peccary, if properly treated, could perhaps become a domesticated animal. Two essential characteristics of a potential domesticated animal (Zeuner 1963) are that the animal first be a social or herd animal and that it tame easily. However, there is no evidence that man has ever truly domesticated the peccary, although evidence of taming individuals as pets is common.

There appears to be a period in early life when following reactions are important. If taken when very young, peccaries will follow a person just as they follow their mother. The age after which taming became difficult was found to be about three days, although the length of this period must be regarded as variable. Those born in captivity that stay with their mother and are not handled remain wild.

I the summer of 1959 I received a pair of two-to-three-day-old litter mates (both females) from Arnold Kester. These young were fed the usual diet of canned milk but were not handed frequently. They remained fairly wild. At about five weeks, one died. At this point it was decided to tame the other animal. Daily and repeated handling had no effect upon this animal: it remained very wild. Sometimes it seemed to be terribly frightened and would run against the wife fence and injure its nose. What appeared to happen in this case was that when the two were together, they were content, but by the time one died the period of easy imprinting on the other had passed.

Generally it appears that a young peccary which has been hand-raised and tamed remains so and will be tame to almost all people. There are certain exceptions to this rule, however, as the penned captives that are tame will often threaten strangers or stay away from the wire.

In November 1958 one notable exception to this general tameness was noted. A young animal was hand-reared by Mrs. Hal Gras of Tucson and was extremely tame. At the age of 26 weeks, it was given to the wildlife unit collection and put with a mature male with which it was compatible. For over a month, however, it appeared wild in its new surroundings. It avoided its new handlers and would not come up to the wire like most hand-reared animals. Of more than 20 tamed pets taken from various handlers and put in the unit’s collection, all were tractable and showed little or no discrimination toward specific handlers.